He did have the cards, after all

and he played them perfectly, too

The Oval Office meeting between Zelenskyy and Trump was perhaps the most outrageous moment of the entire second term, so far. To see a man who had fought Russia on the battlefield for years treated that way made me so angry. Because he and Vance, as much as I despise them both, were speaking for me. I would never have voted for them but there they were, dressing down an ally in front of the entire world.

“You don’t have the cards!” Trump repeated, several times.

Zelenskyy pointed out, correctly, that he was not playing cards to begin with. Thousands of his countrymen have been killed since the 2022 invasion, and if that means a card game analogy doesn’t work for him, he’s earned the right to say so.

But every good leader knows there are things you can share, and things you really need to keep to yourself. Because without the element of secrecy, it’s almost impossible to strike at Putin in the way that was done yesterday.

What matters most, at least to me, is that Trump and his administration were kept in the dark about this. This was a wise move because this information, had it been shared with Trump, would have been relayed directly to Putin. And anyone who is being honest with themselves would agree with this.

Were American funds used in the creation of the drones? It’s hard to imagine that they were not. But, at the same time, the tenor of the U.S. relationship with Ukraine has completely shifted since last November’s election results.

The 24-hour solution to the conflict—which Trump promised again and again on the campaign trail—was never realistic to begin with, since it could only be achieved by a capitulation to Russia. And Zelenskyy is not about to let that happen, either.

As the Kenny Rogers song says, “you’ve got to know when to hold ‘em” and that’s exactly what Zelenskyy did for the entirety of the current Trump term. The temptation to tell Trump that he had it wrong about Ukraine’s readiness to keep fighting must have crossed Zelenskyy’s mind over the course of their Oval Office meeting. Yet there were aces up his sleeve on that day, and it took months for the rest of the world to find this out.

Bravo, President Zelenskyy, and Slava Ukraini!